What If?
by obsidians
Summary: What if your life could be different? Reno's backstory and how his choices got him where he is today. Not a pairing.


Reno walked into Seventh Heaven and ordered a double scotch, right bang on the legal serving time to the very second.

"You're starting early" Tifa observed as she sat at the bar making an inventory of her booze bottles while Denzel and Marlene played in a corner and let out the occasional giggle.

"I'm just having one of those sorts of days. Heya Squirts" he called at them.

"Yo Reno" they called back, imitating his slang accent and giving him dimpled, devilish smiles.

He just smiled back, genuinely liking the pair of orphans, they were just nice kids that got luckier than he ever had with his upbringing. Not that he begrudged them that.

"Do you mind if I turn on the TV?" He asked Tifa.

"You want to watch the game? How much you have riding on it?" Tifa asked him with a mock frown.

"I would like to watch the news" he said.

"I never pegged you for the news sort" Tifa said but handed him the remote.

"There's a lot about me you don't know" Reno said as he flicked it on. "People are mourning as Trevor Stewart, patriarch of one of the wealthiest families on Gaia died early this morning..."

"Not everyone" Reno said under his breath as he took a sip of his drink.

"What was that?" Tifa asked him.

"Nothing" Reno muttered.

"Trevor was known for his generosity towards the underprivileged..."

"Don't make me laugh" Reno muttered.

"He was survived by a surprise heir apparent no one knew about..."

"I wonder where they dug him up?" Reno muttered again.

"Everyone has gathered outside the gates of the family-only attended funeral to say goodbye to their beloved icon..."

"Not everyone. Some of us hated the fucking hypocrite. Burn in hell" Reno said and then toasted the screen.

The heir apparent was about Reno's age and had dark hair and famous Stewart eyes were there as they were with every male born of the Stewart line, as they were dominate gene and matched Reno's own.

Where it Began

Martin Stewart was from one of the wealthiest families on Midgar and wasn't known for slumming but liked punk bands and upon occasion would literally go to the slums and hit some clubs where his favourite bands played. He protected his identity by only going by the name Mareno because he thought it sounded cool.

He was tall and gorgeous with hair so red it looked unnatural and his soulful eyes caused many a maiden to sigh. He was on top of the world at eighteen: he was rich, attractive and had a bright future ahead of him as he had just gotten accepted to one of the top universities to pursue his dream of becoming a brain surgeon.

He was considered to be: a happy, go lucky sort, who had a killer smile and was a genuinely nice person.

He wasn't very lucky that night when his motorcycle broke down outside the event and he stood in the rain trying to get it going. Having no idea how to get home without drawing attention to himself; his father had forbidden him to go to that area. "Do you need some help?" A sweet voice asked him as a nearby van rolled down a window. He turned his head and pushed his wet hair back and and looked to her and was instantly smittened: she was a girl close to his age with long blonde hair and the face of an angel.

"I'm Cora, I'll take you home to my father, he can help you. He's a mechanic" she explained.

"I'm Martin" he introduced himself, giving the young beauty his real name...and that is how they met.

Months Later

"I want you Cora..." Martin moaned to her as they made out in the backseat of his sportscar.

"You know I'm waiting for marriage" she panted.

"We're going to get married anyway. I love you" he said and meant it. Cora just kissed him back all the more furiously and...

Oops

"Cora's pregnant and I want to marry her" Martin insisted to his father, Trevor.

"Over my dead body you'll marry that gutter trash whore. Have you forgotten about Samantha?" Trevor asked his son.

"She's not my fiancée" Martin insisted.

"She's the sort of girl you ought to marry and will marry. Until then, get rid of that tramp or you can kiss all of this goodbye" Trevor said waving his hands around to encompass the wealth that surrounded them.

"Love's more important" Martin challenged.

"Oh to be young and in love" Trevor said in a mocking voice. "Will you still love her when you're living in her apartment with her family with a squalling brat. With her pushing out another one once a year, while you mop floors for a living in hospitals where you could have performed miracles in? You're not qualified for anything. The door's that way, but once it closes, you're never coming back in. You'll be dead to me. All of you" Trevor said and Martin turned away in confusion, shaken and not sure what to do.

Month Even Later

"I can't see you. It's not forever, just until I can change my father's mind about us" Martin told the four-month pregnant girl.

"But I need to see you. I miss you. You said you loved me and wanted to marry me" she all but pleaded with him and then slammed the door of his car and ran inside and Martin's tears ran down his own face and was glad he was leaving for university soon.

Even More Months Go By

"You came! You have to meet your son. This is Justin; I named him after your grandfather as you said you wanted your first child to be named that in honour of him. He has the Stewart eyes; you said that it's a dominate gene in the male line and he even has your hair" she said smoothing her hand over the fine ginger strands on the newborn's head and the small boy wrinkled his face and opened his eyes. "Isn't he the prettiest baby you ever saw?" She cooed and looked desperately at the frowning Martin.

"He's not mine. You could have slept with hordes of other redheads. I can't believe what lengths you've gone through to try and trap me! Girls like you are so predictable" he said with a smirk she had never seen but Avalanche members would know that look well.

"But Martin, I've only ever been with you. We're in love" she all but pleaded with him as she held Justin towards him.

"I don't want to touch your bastard! Keep away from me and keep him away from me. Here, take this money for the good times you showed me if you want it so badly. You earned it after all" he said, taking all the money he had in his wallet and flinging it at her. She just buried her head into the precious bundle in her arms and started to sob as if her heart was breaking, while he stormed off.

Martin had ultimately chosen the money and had agreed to let Cora go, but he felt bad as he drove into the night, upset at how things had turned out and his vision was blurred with tears. He didn't even notice as he went through a red stoplight and another car struck his and caused it to roll. He was dead before it even settled to the ground.

Cora wept when she heard on the news about Martin's death and grew desperate as her child's grandfather refused to see her and was threatening her father's business if she told anyone the truth about her son. Cora couldn't let that happen and packed a bag and stole off into the night with her baby. She stopped by a doctor's office and paid for a DNA test for her son to be tested against the bright strands of red hair that she had in her hairbrush that Martin would use upon occasion.

Justin grew up not knowing who his father was and bore the burden of that at school and learned to fight, he was an angry kid but intelligent as no other kid had ever been in their humble school.

Cora after working three jobs to support them; got cancer and rapidly deteriorated. "There's a loose floorboard under my bed. Take what you find there and go to that address" she said as she lay dying. "Go now!" She ordered him.

"I can't leave you" the twelve-year-old sobbed as he held his once beautiful mother's hand.

"You have to go there. With your granddad and grandma dying in that car accident, there's no one who can take you. Go see your grandfather, he had to take you in, beg him if you must but go now!" she insisted and he did.

A very reluctant housekeeper took Reno in and he sat in the kitchen being fed by the kindly cook who had a boy about his age at him. Reno couldn't believe people lived like this as he clutched his backpack to him and followed the pretty lady in a suit and was shown into a marble office.

The man behind the desk was past middle age but still handsome and his blue eyes weighted and measured the skinny redhead in his ratty jeans and worn denim jacket and obviously found him wanting. "I'm told you're my Gramps" Reno said and his slanged accent caused the other man to wince at how it grated on his delicate ears.

"You are nothing to me, boy" he said standing up so he towered over the preadolescent.

"But this DNA test proves that..." He began.

"Proves nothing; my genes could have never produced something like you. We are descended from royalty. You're nothing but gutter trash. You can take that lousy DNA test to whoever you wish, but I will deny it. Your mother's dead and that means you're a ward of the state. I've already contacted the authorities to come and get you. I wouldn't open your mouth and claim any relationship to me. I hear those places aren't very safe" he said pinning him to the spot with his eyes.

"How can you be so heartless? I have the test; your son was my father! It was my mother's dying wish I come here" Reno cried with his fists clenched.

"We protect our own in this family, but you're not one of us. You're a base born rat bastard that's going to die alone in some nameless gutter" Trevor sneered at him.

And that's how Reno ended up in a group home where he helped form a gang and they christened it by getting matching tattoos on their faces.

Reno was sixteen when he saw his grandfather again.

"It would just be a loan and then I will never bother you again. I need to pay for the cost to join the academy is all. It's expensive. I could have a future there. If you would just loan me the money" he asked him, refusing to beg the frowning man and Trevor noted that the boy was on his way to manhood and was filling out and wore his dead son's face. That could mean he inherited Martin's almost supernatural way of attracting women to himself...

"You showed such protentional in school. Why did you dropout?" Trevor interrupted him.

"What's a degree going to do for me? I made a mistake joining my gang. They do...terrible things" he admitted, showing his real age for a few second and glanced nervously at the other man, who didn't look swayed. "I want to get away from the slums and this is my way out. I'll sign anything you put in front of me, declaring I'm not related to you" Reno promised him.

"Very well, I will give you the money, but I want something of you..." Trevor said and lined it out for him.

"A vasectomy?" Justin said with a bitter laugh. "Those are your terms? I guess you want to make sure this mongrel bastard doesn't have other bastards to pollute your precious gene pool? Very well, I accept that" Reno said.

Reno sat before the doctor he explained the procedure. "Very well, when can we do it?" He asked him.

The doctor looked at him in sympathy. Aware the teenager wasn't even old enough to shave. "Son, are you sure about this? You have your whole life ahead of you. What is you decide to marry and want kids?" He asked him.

"I don't want any of that. That's a joke. When can we schedule this?" He all but demanded. He walked into the room in his hospital gown and lay down on the sterile bedding. "Let's do this" he said with conviction in his voice.

"Congratulations, you're now officially a Turk. We, only go by first names and have last names only for legal purposes. What name would you like?" Tseng asked him.

"Just pick one" Justin said dismissively.

"With that hair, you remind me of this guy who used to show up for shows when I used to date a girl who played in a punk band. His name was Mareno or something like that" Tseng said, not realizing he was talking about Justin's father.

"Mareno. Reno. I like that, it's unique. As for my last name. I would like to go by my mother's last name of Sinclair" the newly coined Reno said.

When he was twenty-six, his grandfather summoned him and Trevor was surprised at the change in his appearance and realized Justin looked how his son would have if he'd reached manhood, rather than just hovering on the cusp of it.

This man still had his hideous facial tattoos and wore his obviously expensive suit like a hobo's rags, but there was a quiet authority and confidence that demanded respect. There was also something calculating about him.

"Watcha want, old man?" Reno said, taking a seat heavily on a priceless chair like it was a ten gils stool without asking.

"Justin, I realize that I've done you wrong. I want us to have a relationship, a real one. I want to take you into the family as my rightful heir. I want to get to know you" Trevor said as humbly as possible.

"It's Reno now. Too little, too late. You had years to approach me like this. You let my mother die; her cancer was treatable in the early stages but we didn't have the money for treatment. You let me go into a group home for fuck's sake. Why the change of heart, Gramps?" He snapped, leaning forward in interrogation.

"I'm dying" Trevor admitted. "I need to establish someone in my place. I'm offering you all of this. You can be schooled and polished up to the correct image. The woman your father was supposed to marry, she has a very pretty daughter. You could marry her, she's willing. She can help you..." Trevor said.

Reno just gave the same laugh that had gotten more bitter and cynical with age. "So now you're running out of options and I suddenly seem like a good candidate to take over as family leader? Dying alone is perfect for an asshole like you. Fuck that, I want nothing to do with you. You haven't been there for me my whole life and if I was to marry your debutant, she would divorce me. Remember? I can't have kids because you neutered me" he reminded him.

Trevor registered he was speaking without a trace of his usual clipped slang speech. "Your accent?" He asked him, what he had just said not sinking in yet. How could anyone say no to a vast fortune?Justin's grammar was now just a polished as his own.

"I can talk either way if I wish. I'm proud of where I come from and don't care if it offends anyone if I speak that way. My answer is no, I think that you're dying is perfect. How many people suffered because of you? I read my father's letters to my mother. He was in love with her. I wish you a slow and agonizing death and hope you save me a seat in hell for when I get there. Bye Gramps" Reno said and slouched off without a backwards glance.

Present Day

"Hey Tifa, why did you never have children of your own and don't give me that shit about you not being married. If there was a slim chance that Cloud would have knocked you up, I know you would have had it" Reno suddenly said.

Tifa was surprised by how personal the normally aloof man's question was. "I can't have children. I'm sterile because of Sephiroth's blade" she said touching her scar."Have you ever considered settling down and having some yourself?" She asked him in return, since the ball was already rolling.

"I can't have them either. I had an operation to prevent that when I was sixteen" he said taking a sip of his drink.

"Why so young?" Tifa asked him, going to pour him another.

"I wasn't given much of a choice and can't elaborate on that" Reno replied and watched as the new multibillionaire was being interviewed and realized that could have been him. "Do you ever wish your life had been different?" He asked her, trying to imagine what it would have been like if his grandfather had taken him in the day he first showed up there, had loved him and raised him as a real grandfather should have. What would he be like today? Hopefully not one of those pastel wearing dweebs with manicured nails!

"You mean what if Cloud had never left and we had married? I imagine we would have had a passel of kids and hopefully survived Sephiroth attack. I do wish that late at night when looking at Cloud's empty bed and then I look at them and realize I wouldn't change a thing, the good and the bad" Tifa said as she watched the two kids as Denzel looked enraged when Marlene put a flowered hat on his head and then blushed when she kissed him on the cheek. "I'll never know how it feels to give birth to a child, but they're my children as much as if I carried them. I would kill for them" Tifa admitted with a fond smile on her face. "Are you content with your life?" She asked the normally closed mouthed man. "Wouldn't you like to settle down with someone? You could always adopt. There are so many children in the world needing parents."

Reno thought about things and realized he was. He had good friends, a position of authority and felt happy that there were people like Tifa in the world to care for the orphans, like he himself had been. He'd come a long way in his climb out of the gutter.

"I might consider it someday but not now" he said, tapping his chin in thought. "You know what? I am" he said as he finished his drink and left money on the bar for Tifa to ring it up and keep the generous tip.

She studied the man on the screen that Reno had been watching. Everything about him was polished and spoke of excellent breeding, his voice was smooth and cultured and he'd obviously been coached in what to say. Tifa frowned at how there was something familiar about his eyes but dismissed that as she went to get the snacks ready for the regulars who would be coming in to watch the game she'd paid good money for to be broadcast on a huge screen TV she'd rented.


End file.
